His Wayward Ways
by Divinely Ethereal
Summary: As the village church became his beloved Maria's funeral pyre, Miguel thought he was finally being punished for his wayward ways. One-shot: Chronicles Miguel's background/past


**His Wayward Ways**

_**A/N: So I put this together in a hurry. I can't tell you how much the style/structure of it bothers me. Love Miguel's profile picture on TekkenZaibatsu, though. Guy should be voted most gorgeous Tekken stud. Screw anime rejects in super hero wannabe outfits. Hopefully, I'll be getting Tekken6 when I get home for Xmas.**_

For as long as he could remember, Miguel Caballero Rojo had harboured a deep loathing for members of the clergy. It was those infernal Roman Catholic priests who all but ran the small, rural community of Miguel's youth, and not the well-to-do plantation owners like his father. It was those priests who told people to writhe in discomfort at the merest thought of sin; to constantly cower in fear of being struck down by His invisible hand; it was those priests who held the delicate fabric of their society together, trapping the populace in a bubble of social norms and practices that should by all means have decayed decades ago; it was those priests who had produced a generation of men and women whose features had been dulled by the stamp of conformity. Indeed, it was men like Father Emmanuel( who used to teach classes at the local Catholic school) who had effortlessly succeeded in turning men like Senor Rojo into overzealous specimen who weilded their bibles as proudly as rulers did their scepters, and bore their crucifixes as ones who were trying to ward off vampires.

It was this rigid austerity, mingled with the dull monotony that accompanied rural way of life, that had forced the young Miguel to hold his wayward ways out like a lethal weapon, a weapon he grew increasingly incapable of putting away, even as time passed and he succeded in gaining his independence.

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Miguel's first act of open defiance had come when he was nine, on a glorious summer morning when he and his cherished sister Maria, his junior by two years, had decided to take the old tin bathtub out front, intending to bathe together in the warm sunshine. Too young to feel self-conscious about their bodies, they had been apprehended by their parents and had initially buckled underneath the pair's hysterical raving about the sin of nakedness. The young Miguel had quickly rallied, and shielding his sister from their condemnatory view, had quietly proclaimed that it wasn't nakedness that was sinful, but what 'nasty' things people did when they were naked . That had earned him a stinging slap that had sent him reeling. Despite his pain, he had proceeded to wrench the silver crucifix that had been his since birth off his neck, and had flung it at his father's feet, declaring through gritted teeth that a God who was as 'silly' as his father made him out to be did not deserve to be worshipped.

That piece of blasphemy, his initiation into his wayward ways, had not had pleasant consequences, for either him or Maria.

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Miguel had gradually become acquainted with other youthful misfits over the years- Gabriel Rodriguez ,Julio Prado, and others whose names were uttered with various degrees of contempt by the conservative populace. United together in their restless, rebellious streaks and dissipated lifestyles, the youths had the run of the village during the night.

Who else would start drunken brawls at Earnesto's bar during week nights, with strangers and sons of wealthy plantation owners alike?

Who else would holler drunkenly from the rooftop of the village church during the grey early morning hours?

Who else would seek to deflower every eligible young girl?

Who else would tie a police constable to a goat and set the hapless pair adrift in the river?

Yet Miguel always went to excesses his cohorts never dared experiment with.

Nobody else would engage in drinking competitions at Earnesto's that would leave them half-dead with alcohol poisoning.

Nobody else would brutally headbutt and crack the skull of another youth over a disagreement involving 20 _paesos_ left over from a gambling debt.

Nobody else would burn down the wine and olive oil storages of a well-to-do plantation over a quarrel with the owner's son.

Certainly, nobody else would _dare _ to strike a priest.

The day Miguel had lashed out at Father Emmanuel, the priest had been chastising him for his irresponsible behaviour. The Father had callously remarked that he was surprised Maria had not become a 'tramp' with an older brother such as Miguel for a role model. It had been the explosion of a lifetime for the teenage Miguel. He had let out an inhuman bellow, cleared the distance between the two of them in a single leap and fastened on the old Father, dealing him blow after blow, seeing nothing but red, until he was wrenched off.

Two days later had found Miguel lying down on a pile of hay, in Father Emmanuel's barn, next to his only daughter. His eyes had been alight with malignant triumph, which the poor besotted girl had surely mistaken for affection, and he had cupped her face in his hands, whispering sweet nothings. His only thoughts had been about how he had soiled her, and would continue to do so-_ who's the tramp now, Father?_

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Maria had never approved of( what she'd known of) Miguel's rebellious capers, but the two of them had been partners in crime of another sort, for only in one another had they confided their hopes, dreams and aspirations- as fragile as those might be; hopes of one day escaping the crushing, oppressive state of things; the hopeless innertia that plagued their existence. They had seen themselves as shooting saplings, in danger of becoming stunted plants if continuously deprived of light. Their light they had seen in each other; in the picture books, histories and encyclopedias that had spoken to them of wondrous places they could one day seek to see; in the lovely, cheerful waltzes Maria had been capable of drawing out of her violin, waltzes that had convinced them for a few precious moments that theirs was not a meaningless existence; in invented games that had afforded them temporary release from stagnation.

And yet, some other vital ingredient had to be missing, because Miguel had continued his descent into his wayward ways.

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Miguel's punishments had been a routine thing. His father had often taken his belt-or cane- to his back, but almost as often, when the old man had been at the end of his tether after a particularly exhausting day, he would simply lock Miguel in the freezing wine cellar, or in the barn with the stinking animals, sometimes for days on end. Miguel had never minded those punishments much; the welts on his back proved to him that he had endured, passed the test; the chill in the cellar could never conquer him, and the animals in the barn had never insulted or demeaned him like the humans up in the house whom he'd called his parents.

The punishment he would have rather died than endured was the one administered with the assistance of Father Emmanuelo. His father, exasperated with his unruly behaviour, would chain him to his bed, and Miguel would watch in horror as Father Emmanuelo's gloating face, a mask of hate, would appear above the bed, bible in hand, muttering fragments of scripture and making wild gestures with his free hand above Miguel's head, as though the boy were possessed and to be exorcised. The night would be alive with the sound of Miguel's screams of outrage mingled with Maria's ineffectual protests at his treatment.

Frequently, even when Miguel had done no wrong, he would find his father's Bible sitting on his bed or desk, waiting for him, his father having already marked out one condemnatory passge or another for him to read. Miguel, who would have been so tempted to commit the sacrilige of hurling the Bible out of his window, would instead patiently scrawl ' _judge not that ye be not judged_' on a note which he would then tape to the Bible before returning it to his father's door.

It had never really mattered to Miguel what his father or others tried. He would still persist in his wayward ways with a tenacity that defied explanation.

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The day Miguel had been thrown out of the house, he had arrived late one night, and predictably drunk, to see that his normally quiet sister Maria was doing vicious verbal battle with their father. Maria had apparently been pleading with him to send her to a music institute where she could learn the violin professionally-something Miguel had suggested to her. Maria had suddenly raised her voice and their intolerable father instantly slapped her.

"Let 'er alone!" Miguel had slurred, the words almost unintelligible. He had lurched forwards, cursing the buzz in his head and the thick veil of drunkenness that would not lift off him-even for his own sister.

His father's eyes had suddenly been alight with a manic energy as he 'd advanced on him instead. " You useless excuse of a son! You fill your sister's head with tripe, and then you come home dead drunk! I've had it with you! I want you out of my house! NOW!"

What followed had had a confused, fantastical quality, seen through Miguel's drunken haze. It had then finally come to him that he was lying face down on the ground a few yards from his own front door. His ageing father had managed to hurl his own seventeen-year-old , six-one, 175 lbs- frame out of the door. _Him_. A frequent brawler who had never lost a fight. He had groaned and attempted to pick himself off the ground.

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The following night, Miguel Rojo secured for himself a job at Earnesto's, waiting on tables and throwing out troublemakers. Two days later, his first letter to Maria-an apology and a plea for her to visit- was delivered.

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Ten years later, as the village church became his beloved Maria's funeral pyre, Miguel thought he was finally being punished for his wayward ways.

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End file.
